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US Visa Applications Must Be Submitted from Country of Residence or Nationality

(travel.state.gov)
115 points cdipaolo | 3 comments | 07 Sep 25 16:56 UTC | HN request time: 0.607s | source
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ashray ◴[07 Sep 25 17:20 UTC] No.45160149[source]▶
This was already the case for almost every other country. Most embassies required you to be resident or a national of the country you are applying in.

So oddly, the US was far more permissive than other locales in this one aspect. All this change does is bring it in line with security practices that other nations already had in place.

Honestly am quite surprised that the US didn’t already have this restriction considering overall it’s one of the toughest countries to get a visa for or even enter with a valid visa.

The US visa vetting procedure is known to be so strict even for tourists that many nations give visa free access to nationals who would otherwise require a visa - just because they hold a valid (or sometimes even expired!) US visa. It’s a highly regarded sticker if you can get one in your passport and seriously ups the power of your passport if it’s a weaker one to start with.

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abxyz ◴[07 Sep 25 17:27 UTC] No.45160247[source]▶
Really? Do you have any examples? I’ve had visas around the world (and encountered numerous weird requirements) but never have I been required to apply for a visa from my country of nationality. Even China, which is very restrictive, allows for non-national applications.

(And in fact, in my experience, it is getting easier with online applications becoming more common.)

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1. viceconsole ◴[07 Sep 25 17:48 UTC] No.45160478[source]▶
It's common for countries to require you to apply from your country of nationality or residence, and to prove lawful residence if you're not a national of the country you're applying in. I'm in the middle of a French visa application for my daughter right now, and she must apply in the U.S. where she's a citizen.
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2. daft_pink ◴[08 Sep 25 04:17 UTC] No.45164587[source]▶
I’m not an expert at this, but is it true that the US is very unique in requiring interviews for all tourist visas and for almost every visa?

I’m American and every visa I’ve had to apply for did not require my physical presence at the embassy and I used a third-party processing service to get everything done.

Therefore, while I would need to apply to these countries from their US embassy because my physical presence was not required, I would generally not need to return to the United States to obtain their visa?

And this aspect of a US visa does make it significantly harder even though the application policy is similar to other countries?

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3. viceconsole ◴[09 Sep 25 02:53 UTC] No.45176851[source]▶
I'm not aware of any other country besides the US that has a blanket policy of requiring at least one interview in almost all cases.

That said, back in the 2000s I had to apply in person at the French embassy for a student visa, in in the 2010s I had to apply in person at a Chilean consulate for a special visa.

Many countries have outsourced the bulk of their processing to contractors like VFS or TLS these days. But also, our experience as Americans is not representative as we generally have fewer visas we need to bother obtaining, and face less scrutiny when doing so.

I'm not sure if the US interview requirement makes it "harder" to get a US visa - it may be that getting a US visa is just harder than getting another country's visa, which might still be true even if we didn't interview people. The big thing that makes getting non-immigrant visas to the US difficult for many people is that, unless shown otherwise, US immigration law assumes you are an immigrant.